


Batty For You, Valentine

by Kingtorygg



Category: Batman: Arkham (Video Games), DCU
Genre: Action, Action/Adventure, Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Arkham Asylum, Arkham Verse, F/M, Gen, Genderbending
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-01
Updated: 2016-07-01
Packaged: 2018-07-19 11:55:56
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,946
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7360459
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kingtorygg/pseuds/Kingtorygg
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A little over a year has gone by since Gotham City's Christmas Eve catastrophe and the opening of Arkham Asylum. With Valentine's Day just around the corner and Arkham's security clearly not as up to par as it had claimed, Gotham becomes more nervous as the days go by and the holiday gets closer. Bianca Wayne struggles to maintain a healthy balance between her personal life and the duties that come with the cowl while preparing for the worst come the Fourteenth. Her abilities to keep Gotham safe come into question at the arrival of a new addition to the household. </p>
<p>Loosely based off Arkham games and Earth-11 DC. Not all characters are gender bent. Why gender bend characters at all? Why not?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Batty For You, Valentine

Introduction

Slivers of pale light from the moon peeked out from behind its armor of thick smog which loomed over Gotham City, painting the sky grey in the daytime and starless at night. February did no favors for the city either. On the grounds of Arkham Asylum --which was reopened after Christmas a little over a year before in spite of its bloody history-- the guard patrols were business as usual. The most unusual and most unstable inhabitants made no noise in their cells as the guards prowled the halls and winding paths between buildings. It was nearing the witching hour, and most inhabitants were exhausted or bored.

  
In a cold corner of the gardens, a guard patted himself down in the dark, looking for something that did not seem to have been stowed away in his pockets. Footsteps in the soft grass behind him called his attention to someone coming to join him, and he turned to his new companion, whom the other could not make out in the dark save for the familiar smell of tobacco and another unfamiliar, faint odor accompanying it.

  
“Hey, pal, can I bum a cigarette?”

  
After a moment’s rustling of fabric, and the sound of the carton rattling with only a few left, a cigarette was provided. The guard that had been looking now patted himself down in search for a way to light it, but for the first time the silent companion spoke up.

  
“Need a light?” his voice was gravelly, rough. No one the other recognized.

  
“Yeah--,” the alarm sounded off in another sector rather close to the present one, and the sound of boots hitting concrete beckoned him away from smoking, but he never had the chance to respond. The guard went up in flames within seconds, screaming and writhing around in the wet grass to no avail. The unfamiliar odor he had detected was kerosene, and the man cackling as he stood above him took flight into the blank night sky while the chaos that was ensuing allowed him.

***

“Really, Harvey, I had a wonderful time,” Billionaire Bianca Wayne assured her date as she stared through the tinted window of Harvey’s wine-colored Rolls-Royce. It was a car he was proud of, having made the restorations himself. He only used it for occasions he felt were special enough.

  
“And that’s why you’re leaving so early?”

  
“A girl needs her beauty sleep.” Normally Bianca might stay until the clock struck twelve, but if she was completely true to herself, she wanted to get home and suit up. The night had been seemingly peaceful thus far, but for the past year or so, she vowed to be more vigilant. Gotham was unpredictable now. She had also told Alfred that she would be back before midnight, and wanted to keep her word.  
The ride home was quiet save for the casual conversation they carried on, and Miss Wayne took his arm to walk through the front door. Harvey Dent smiled to himself and offered her a peck on the cheek as they stood in front of the large oak doors of Wayne Manor.

“So, Bianca, do you think I’ll see you for Valentine’s Day?”

  
Bianca interrupted her subtle rush to say their goodbyes when the question caught her off-guard. Of course, she thought, how could I be so stupid? She hadn’t stopped to think of the consequences of her actions as Billionaire Bianca Wayne in quite some time. The cowl had occupied much of her thoughts.

  
With a quick smile, she took her hand off of the doorknob and planted a kiss on Harvey’s cheek in return, “It’s a date.”

  
It was more likely that she would find some way to cancel on him before, but she would have to formulate an excuse that wouldn’t be offensive. After finally saying their goodbyes, she rushed to her father’s old study, and descended the hidden staircase. The computer was blinking with an alert once she found it, and her eyes widened at what she saw.

  
“I hope you weren’t planning to leave without telling me, Miss Wayne.” Alfred entered the same way she had, but clad in his pajamas and bathrobe.

  
“Sorry, Alfred. I got caught up in thinking,” She said, but quickly directed his attention to the screen, “There’s been a jailbreak at Arkham.”

  
“Arkham Asylum?” He was clearly as taken aback by this as she was, but she spent a little more effort in hiding it, “The same place which boasted about its security? And where that dreadful clown character is being contained?”

  
Bianca was already suiting up by the time Alfred finished, but she didn’t answer. She changed quickly, switching her wine colored floral-print dress for Kevlar and her black suede pumps for sturdy combat boots. The gloves she shamelessly took last Christmas from a corpse once known as The Electrocutioner still worked wonderfully for her, and were a great advantage in hand-to-hand combat.

  
“Do be careful.” Alfred warned as she got in the car. Finally, The Bat was speeding towards the city bathed in neon lights and the sins of its less reputable denizens.

  
The car came to a screeching halt in an alley, where she launched herself high into the air, soaring gracefully until she perched herself on a flagpole, staying perfectly still. There were apparently a number of escaped patients, ones she dealt with over a year before when she was only an urban legend.

  
Garfield Lynns—the media had taken to calling him ‘Firefly’—was among the escaped. Most others seemed to have already been apprehended and were barely worthy of note. It would seem Arkham Asylum was handling its first jailbreak better than she had expected.

  
She pressed her forefinger to a hidden button on her cowl to open a communications channel with Alfred waiting in the Batcave.

  
“Alfred, have the plane do an aerial scan of the city. Look for fires, or better yet: look for Garfield Lynns. I’m keeping a lookout on foot. Don’t want him making an escape if he sees me in the car.”  
“Of course. The plane should start making its rounds in just under a minute. ”

  
The comm went silent, and she grappled her way up to a higher vantage point only to speed up on the line and launch herself into flight hundreds of feet above the ground. She was headed for Wayne Enterprises, one of the tallest buildings in the city, which would hopefully provide an advantage in trying to spot the lunatic from up high.

  
The Bat barely made it to the tower when the sound of a maniac’s cackling caught her attention. She leapt into another glide off the rooftop of some apartment building and stuck the landing to one whose distance she over-estimated with a roll. Immediately she dove for cover behind her flame-retardant cape, but considered that residents would likely prefer if there wasn’t a fire on their roof, she made a break for the ledge once Lynns had passed over her in the opposite direction.

  
“Ha! Haha! Where’re ya goin’ hot stuff?” he called after her. If her fight or flight reflex wasn’t so busy, she might have found the time to roll her eyes and prepare for a slew of fire related puns.  
He came buzzing overhead where she had jumped off and searched the adjacent rooftop frantically in search of his opponent, now hunting for her. She had hidden herself behind a heating and cooling system, and it wouldn’t take long for him to find her. Jumping out of hiding with her lightning-fast reflexes, a glob of thick, sticky glue was tossed in his direction, just like she had done the year before.  
“Yeach! Gross!” he shouted. Lynns struggled and kicked trying to get his arms out of that mess, and yet another opportunity was presented.

  
The Batclaw was fired and it latched onto his foot. With all of her strength, she tugged on the cable, drawing resistance from her opponent, who pulled in the opposite direction. From a recent snowfall, the roof was covered in a half-melted sludge, and her struggle was imprinted on it. Wet snow slopped and squashed under her boots as she fought to keep her footing and to hold her opponent where he was in the air. He wouldn’t fight like this for long.

  
Fire spat in her direction and she needed to make a dive, but wouldn’t go anywhere without him. The Dark Knight charged for the ledge of the building which faced the street and they started their slow plummet for a moment in time when the machinery adjusted to the added weight. This time around he wouldn’t be taking her along for a ride. He’d just come from Arkham, where he’d been locked up for the past year, and the equipment bore the same scratches and dents Bianca had made on it the last time they saw each other and had only received rudimentary repairs. He hadn’t had the time to make everything fully functional before his escape which meant that soon, Firefly would be out of gas or making a plunge for the earth.

  
“You got off easy last year, Bat! You made one hell of a mistake stringin’ me up on that bridge!”

  
He started the old game they played. She was strung along behind him, dodging every structure he tried to fling her into to shake her off. The adrenaline pumping through her veins made her near unstoppable.  
Another rooftop came up and her feet lightly touched the surface before the engine of his pack started sputtering. This was her chance. Cover was available behind another heating and cooling system on this roof, bulky and loud as it ran because of its age, but big and strong enough to take the force of a body ramming into it. She forced him to slow down as she collided with the metal frame of the system that she used to anchor herself.

The pack Firefly wore whined when he tried forcing her out of her cover once more, and it began to smoke. Bianca tugged on the heavy-duty chord that held onto him, and Lynns screeched as he sailed in a direction he didn’t choose. He fired from his flamethrower and she dove for cover. The more fuel he used the less time he had.

  
Again she heard the sound of the pack protesting as he put it to work, and while he was distracted with attempted escape, she tossed another dose of the glue he hated, this time directly for the wings.

“Ew!” he shouted as the wings started to make the sounds akin to a hard working Turing machine. He pushed further, and there was a satisfying pop before it puttered and whined once more. He began his downward arc towards the ground, and the Bat had to fight to keep him from touching the ground. It had caught her off guard and threw her off balance, but she held on tight and fought against gravity with all her might. Lynns was heavy with all his gear on, but he wasn’t anything she couldn’t handle. Once she had regained her composure she anchored him to a secure structure on the roof and checked to see if he was still alive. Much to her relief when he fell he swung and smacked his helmeted head on the side of the brick building, but his heart was still beating and according to the physiology readings coming up in her cowl, his injuries would be nothing but a few broken bones and a concussion. She contacted Alfred.

  
“Send Gordon these coordinates, Alfred. Lynns isn’t going to be any more trouble.”


End file.
